All pages, including the Works Cited page, have the author’s last name and page number in the upper right corner of each page.
The first page should start with the heading in the upper left, followed by the Title (centered) and opening paragraph.
The body of the essay follows and should support your thesis — which is the last sentence of the opening paragraph.
Within the body, you should support your thesis with your own thoughts and observations, outside sources, and both direct quotes and paraphrasing.
Just remember — direct quotes and paraphrasing need to be cited with in-text citations.
With paraphrasing, even though you may have changed the majority of the original text to summarize it, you still need to cite the original source of these thoughts. (If you don’t, that is plagiarism.)
You need to have at least four to six sources to support your thesis and main points in your paper.
For the conclusion, you should re-state your thesis statement/main idea of your argument in a slightly different way than your first paragraph. The conclusion should show the reader that your thesis/argument is well supported in the body and that you are once again reiterating your main point/argument.
Your Works Cited page should be in the correct MLA format and show ALL the sources that you used in the body of your paper.
In other words, your in-text citations should match with your sources listed in the Works Cited page.
Another way to look at this: You should never have an in-text citation within your essay that is not reflected on your Works Cited page, and vice versa.
